Why You Shouldn't Be a Genius
by Hopeless Desires
Summary: Kisaragi Shintaro is enrolled into a special high school, but he has one goal in his mind: Avoid people like the plague. And then he met Kokonose Haruka, his roommate, who can't take a hint. Suddenly, people are gaining unhealthy attractions to him, and he has two ways to get out of this big mess: one, friendzone them. Two, hack their files. Option two sounds perfect [All/Shintaro]
1. Chapter 1

**High School Project**

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**Summary: **Kisaragi Shintaro, first year, is roommates with Kokonose Haruka, who just won't take a hint. Couple that with his younger, weird brothers, his two violent friends, a girl who disappears off the face of the planet the moment you look away, another girl who must be related to Haruka, her conman of a brother, and his mother hen of a brother, too. And then they gain an unhealthy attraction to him. AllShin.

**Notes: **Below is a preview of the fanfiction. If I gain even one review that wants me to make this into an actual chapter fic, I will. If I don't, I probably won't.

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**Preview**, _mornings _and _incompetents_

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Kisaragi Shintaro was knocking on his roommates's brothers' door, which really should be broken by now.

They weren't his friends. At all. He just woke them up because Haruka...asked him...? Haruka wasn't his friend either.

_Liar_, a figurative voice told him plainly, _for a genius, you really are hell bent on fooling yourself. Don't pretend you haven't come to the conclusion that Haruka's trying to trick you into befriending more people. Mainly, the two lonely little brothers he has...and himself._

_Go screw yourself, _he told the voice solemnly, ignoring the obvious symptom of insanity, and instead opting on breaking down the door with one fist. Really, the entire floor had stated depending on Shintaro's daily knocking ritual as their alarm clocks. Most of them were never late anymore.

"Kuroha!" he knocked louder. "Konoha! Wake up now, or else I'll hack into your computers and destroy them!"

A moment later, a drowsy, messy haired Konoha opened the door. His hair was open and short in the front, deceiving the person in front of him into believing he had short, boyish hair, while in the back it reached the base of his neck. He looked down at him, blinking sleep thick pink eyes and yawned. "Good morning, Shintaro."

Shintaro felt his eyes half lid while he slightly smiled fondly at him. "Good morning, Kono." He gestured to the dark room and asked, "Is Kuroha awake?"

Konoha shook his head. "Kuroha stayed up late yesterday," he stated. Then, in a plain, small voice, he whispered. "I'm hungry. I can't get ready for school until I eat."

And boy did he eat a lot, Shintaro thought grimly, remembering the time he'd took them to a buffet at one of Momo's concerts.

Shintaro grimaced. He nodded and said, "I'll wake Kuroha, Kono. Just go over to my room and tell Haruka to make extra."

Konoha perked up brightly, and smiled one of his close eye smiles. It wasn't unkown that Konoha and Kuroha didnt know how to cook, and they'd been coming over for breakfast for the past months, but Shintaro still admnatly refused to let go of his loner reputation and acted annoyed when they came over.

They knew, though.

With purpose, Shintaro strolled inside the room, clicked the light's button open (to the dismay of Kuroha, who groaned) and took a bucket and filled it with water. He left the bathroom and stood next to Kuroha's small, curled form under the blankets. "Kuroha," he murmured, "wake up."

Kuroha rolled over and put the pillow over his head.

"You asked for this," he informed him, a glint coloring his sharp eyes. He knocked of the pillow (which was hard, since Kuroha fought for it, going so far as to attempt biting his fingers. Frankly, someone who was retaliating that much shouldn't have any blink of sleep in them) and tangled Kuroha's black hair with his fingers. Kuroha tensed for a second, until he combed it gently, tugging at some knots, stopping when his fingers reached the start of his neck and the end of his scalp. Kuroha let out a soft purr, and snuggled into his hand. Then, Shintaro repeated it again, tenderly this time, now that there weren't any knots, his fingers ghosting over Kuroha's scalp, half-heartedly massaging it.

Kuroha was obviously soothed, and entering a haze of sleep wherein he let out soft, breathy moans. He really was similar to a cat.

And that was when Shintaro dumped the water over him.

"FUCK!"Kuroha cursed, tumbling out of the bed and into the floor. Shintaro didn't hold back his laugh, snickering at him. "What the hell was that for?" He blinked up at him a couple of times. Apparently, Shintaro really had gotten him to fall half way to sleep.

_You're cruel_, the voice from before told him. Shintaro ran his hand through his bangs; he needed to see the school counselor.

"Serves you right," he told him, undeterred when he glared at him with narrowed yellow eyes, "did you really think you'd fool me with that act?"

"I'll get you back," he hissed, like a snake.

Shintaro noted that he should start locking his room every day, whether he was in the room or not. Just in case a homicidal maniac breaks in. Or a snake was set in there. You know, stuff like that.

"It doesn't matter," he replied smoothly, "what does right now is that we're going to be late, and we haven't eaten breakfast yet."

Kuroha frowned. "What's it to you?" He asked. "You don't have to wait for us all day. You don't have to do any of this if you don't like it, but you still do. Why?" Kuroha looked genuinely curious, and Shintaro inwardly fainted.

"I-." He swallowed. "Does it really matter? We're going to be late! Come on, slow poke!" He turned around to march back to his room, but a hand shot out and held him in his place.

"What the fu—"

"Do you care?" Kuroha's voice was soft, a slight touch of hope in it that had Shintaro shocked. "Are we...friends?"

And Shintaro remembered how Kuroha had no friends, aside from his brothers, and that was really just familial obligation, stripped down to it's rawest form. He remembered how he felt, isolating himself because no one understood. Kuroha didn't do it voluntarily, people intended to leave him alone, and if Shintaro felt pangs of pain, then Kuroha was probably worse off.

So, for once, Shintaro ignored his reputation and image, and scoffed, turning around to face Kuroha with flushed cheeks. "Don't be an idiot." He pulled him up. "What do you think? I just wake up an hour early every day to wake you up for no reason? I don't need to wake up an hour and fifteen minutes early for no reason. I only need fifteen minutes to get ready. If that isn't - isn't - . God. You think I'd actually touch your hair _just_ for a prank? I swear, I'm surrounded by incompetents."

Chancing a glance at Kuroha, Shintaro noticed the raw suprise on his face, the way his mouth was slightly open and his cheeks were getting dashed by —

Shintaro paused. Why was Kuroha blushing? Shintaro had an excuse, what about him?

Quickly, feeling his chest tighten and cheeks flame, he turned around, gladly letting go of Kuroha's hand and muttering incomprehensible excuses and 'hurry up's under his breath, he hurried out the door. Stopping just at the edge, he called out, "hurry up, don't keep us waiting too long. I hate waiting," and left.

Unfortunately, (or fortunately) that set off a couple of years of high school that were really, really emotion high, and very embarrassing.

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**A/N: **_possibly my worst work this year. But I have an excuse! I wrote this while I was roleplaying - #multitasking ftw - and I didn't focus on it much. There's a chance I'll turn this into an actual fanfiction, but I'll only really do it if a couple of you people tell me you want me to. I'm a tad too busy to be doing this, anyway, so don't feel like you have to review and tell me I should continue this._

_If I do continue this, I'm going to revise this chapter, and post up the first day, instead of skipping a few months like this oneshot. And I'll make it a AllShin pairing. Konoshin, kuroshin, harushin, ayashin, kanoshin, setoshin, eneshin, takashin, marryshin, HAREMSHIN._

_AND IT WILL BE HAPPY FLUFF! AND HGIH SCHOOL DRAMA!_

**Please, please review and tell me to continue. I want an excuse to be working on this fic. :(**

**Question:** Should I make this into a series of oneshots, or an actual chapter fic, and allow requests for certain moments?


	2. Book Owners are Dangerous (P)

_Ah. Um. Hi?_

_So, I felt really bad when I saw all those Guest reviews asking for updates. I couldn't get into contact with them and inform them, so I've decided to go with this A/N and yet another brief preview._

_Firstly, this story will be updated. Honestly, I have other Kagepro AU ideas that I'm more interested in, but I've noticed that they haven't gotten much feedback. Perhaps time travel and ghosts aren't this fandom's cup of tea? Anyways, I'll try to type in the original chapter one and publish it. And possibly finish the rest of my Kagepro au ideas. I'm on a roll! Three Kagepro stories? That's not enough!_

_AND NOW MY COMPUTER'S SCREEN IS CRAKCED SO ONE OF MY KAGEPRO STORIES IS TOTALLY GONEEEEE WITH THE WIIIINDDDD._

_PS, I've decided to make this a full fledged multi-chapter middle school/high school AU with a non-centered plot and centered character interaction/ aka shippy scenes._

There will be some themes, though, because this can't be a Hopeless Desires fic without the plot twists and angst!

...no! Wait, don't leave! PLEASE COME BACK! I PROMISE IT WON'T BE _TOO_ MUCH!

...What _is_ 'too much'?

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**Chapter **one,

_Bookshop Owners are Dangerous, Meddling People_

**PREVIEW**

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The thing about just waking up, other than the wonderful feeling of contentment and the lasting taste of dreams, is that you have one moment to go back to sleep and hold on to your dream for a few more minutes. If more than a minute passes by and you aren't passed out snoring, good luck knocking yourself out – it isn't going to work.

Shintaro groaned at the alarm clock. Undeterred, it continued singing its high pitched, daily tunes. Shintaro didn't even have to wake up early today – it was Friday, and school had ended yesterday – but he was too used to his weekdays routine, so even if the clock hadn't cut into his sweet dreams, his internal alarm clock would have woke him up.

He slowly, lazily sat up, stretching his arms to the heavens (he made sure to keep his middle fingers closed) and arched his back, cracking his neck while he stood up from the bed.

Friday…what had him booked for Friday morning…? He worked every day – a dead father and a workaholic mother renting out a hospital room did that to you – but certain jobs were scheduled for certain days. Shintaro had tutoring, class room cleaning, online book cover making, and cleaning the dishes in one of the small, popular with the locals, restaurants for the weekdays, while weekends had him fixing electronics (he avoided telling his age to anyone – an online ad under his mother's name did wonders – and besides, people tended to relax around young kids, and so he pretended to take the electronics to his mom when they brought them to him. No such thing happened) babysitting troublesome twins (who knew how to act when he had his eyes on them, after his…talk with them) most of the jobs he had during the weekdays, minus tutoring, and doing domestic jobs for neighbors and elders, usually yard work.

Shintaro was very busy, and by default extremely thankful when Momo had silently walked into his room, a small business card their mother had thrown in the garbage long ago crumbled in her hand, talking into a phone, asking if they still wanted her as an idol, and then promptly gave Shintaro a defiant look when he gave her the look – The If You Know What's Good For You, And If You Don't Want Mom Knowing About That Diet Fad, You'll Kindly Stop This Look – before she dumped the phone in his hand, and perched on his bed, muscles visibly tense. Shintaro had handled it after that; he was the better businessman of the two, and after reading a bunch of psychology books, Self-Help books, fiction novels, body language textbooks, FBI guides, How-to-for-Dummies, and diagnostic dictionaries when he actually had time to read, he'd become really good with people.

Of course, that was when he aimed to attract people. Most of the books he read so he'd do the exact opposite – isolate himself. At first, he'd been curious about people – they didn't seem to think like he did. At all. They seemed shallow, they were entirely too hopelessly indulged in popular people and Queen Bees, unbelievably submissive to all who looked them in the eye and was confident, and liked bad, mommy-says-don't-see/read/play/eat/drink-that stuff. Somehow, along the way, by understanding them more than they did themselves, he'd divided his life between one border. On one side of the border was Shintaro, and the other side was the world. It wasn't Shintaro and the world anymore – it wasn't us anymore.

It was I and them. Them and I. Because understanding but not really understanding put him on a different standing than others.

In the end, Momo had become an idol, had started attracting attention because of their shared attractive singing voice genes, and her eyes.

She had partial heterochromia or sectoral heterochromia, in which part of one iris is a different color from its remainder. Her eyes, starting from the pupil, where orange, and then darkened into a startling, creepy red, before ending at a thin layer of blackish gray. It attracted a lot of attention – "Freak eyes," and bullying – but it looked good on her.

And, to be fair, Shintaro had it too, although there wasn't any orange and his eye was mostly a demonic red. It was hereditary; their father had it too.

Either way, Shintaro managed to squeeze in some studying and sleep, and Momo was contacted for a report on heterochromia, and good god it offered a lot of money that, if they accepted, could have Shintaro quit the dangerous hacking requests he completed and his job in a shady part of the town. Shintaro had a feeling they offered the money because they'd researched information on them, found their background, and decided to manipulate them into it. In the end, they both agreed, and the report would start sometime in the school year.

Momo had passable grades in her classes – not really singing praises worthy – but she had her excuses, what with her job and her semi-daily visits to their mother. Honestly, Shintaro had resigned himself to the fact that to their mother, she'd rather get lost in work and forget about her deceased husband and very much alive children instead of care for said children, even if the times he visited, she had her warm, motherly moments. Shintaro tried not to visit too much, so he wouldn't get too attached, so he'd start forgetting, but he still visited lest the guilt gnawing at his heart successfully swallowed it.

On the other hand, Shintaro passed with top grades. He blamed his photographic memory. After all, there was a reason he mostly tutored kids his age. By reading the textbook with them and explaining it to them, he'd efficiently burned it into his brain. Unfortunately, that job required social contact, and Shintaro tried to be as cold as he could during his tutoring sessions.

(At least he was pretty damn good at teaching idiots, if said idiots were being truthful when they talked to the head teacher about how the sessions were going.)

Shintaro ate a peanut butter sandwich, frowning when it stuck to the roof of his mouth, and drank cold orange juice. His arms felt hot after staying under blankets for about eight hours, give or take an hour. He slipped into the bathroom, took a shower that lasted thirty minutes, and dressed in his usual black jeans, except because it was summer, he slipped on a black short sleeved tee and a red cotton jacket.

Momo found his 'cover every inch of my body on a hot summer day' outfit horrifying, because she couldn't take it. Shintaro argued that it made him stronger and his body started evolving to sweat less. She shut up after they made a trip to the grocery store together and she was the flushed, sweating one.

It was still eight AM. He had class rooms to clean, since it was summer, but after that he was free until evening, where he'd have to go to the restaurant to clean the dishes.

Shintaro dropped his dishes in the sink and left the house feeling strangled.

**. . .**

**Claustrophobia.** Noun. **1**. An abnormal _fear_ of being in _enclosed_ or narrow places.

. . .

It was nearly evening. Dusk was settling around the people walking down Tokyo – masses of homo sapiens, female, male, walking side by side, behind, in front, whom might as well be in their own world. There a hundreds of them squeezed into this streets, the haze of thoughts painting their eyes.

If one person of them disappeared…

Would anyone notice?

…How inconsequential.

Shintaro walked side to side with a bleach blonde girl, eyes glazed and headphones a dull purple. In front of him was the broad back of a well-developed high school boy, swinging a bag on one hand, nearly blasting a petite businessman off his feet, and pinning two textbooks to his hip. He was heading to the library.

The library.

…He sighed through his nose. He'd passed the deadline for returning his books multiple times already. If this continued on, he'd lose his only entertainment outside of the internet option in the cafés. Gah.

He trudged down the streets towards the library. He didn't have to focus to do that, since he knew the way like he knew his way through Vocaloid forums and firewalls. That meant he was lost in thought.

A hand settled on his shoulder, and he was enveloped in the smell of paper and freshly out of the oven cookies, with the underlying scent of soap. He glanced up in alarm, eyes slightly wide, and was horrified to find the face of a smiling, eyes closed, woman.

Ack! Personal space is being invaded! _Pedophile_! Scream, Shintaro, scream!

The woman opened her eyes - strange, eerily glowing red ones - and started talking. Mm, the smell of pineapple gum was nice. "Careful there, kiddo."

"Uh."

She patted of his shoulder and smiled reassuringly once again, before turning to knock on the door to the library.

"Um." He really didn't want to talk to someone, but he needn't to know why the library was - seemingly - closed in the afternoon. The librarian had informed him of the opening and closing times when he'd trudged in at near midnight, soaked to the bone with fatigue, dead on his feet and all but collapsed on a chair. The chair was so comfortable, his eyelids started drooping and the librarian had to shake him by the shoulders to get him to hear five words of her lecture. Eventually, she'd taken pity on him and signed out his books - it was the deadline for returning the books, and it _was_ still pre midnight. Get it? Kisaragi Shintaro was no good with adults - he came of either frigid, cold, blunt, arrogant, or some slow puppy.

"What's wrong with the library?" He finally spit out.

"I don't know." The woman answered back. She knocked twice again, but no one answered. Narrowing his eyes, Shintaro stepped forward and banged at the door thrice.

Shintaro peered at the woman from the corner of his eye. He expected the woman to say, "how rude, kiddo", instead, she set her lips in a determined line and started banging. He bagned again, too, and they were starting to get into some pretty nice rhythm - kind of similar to the cup song - before a loud "I give up!" came, albit a tad muffled, and the door slammed open. The woman's fist came to a stop inches away from the deadly, border-line psychotic librarian. All went quiet.

"The library's closed," the librarian growled. She didn't attack anyone, so Shintaro considered it a win even as his heart plummeted and she brought the door closing. The red eyed woman put her foot in the way.

Ouch. That must've hurt.

And it was gonna hurt more, because nothing hurt more than a psychotic madwoman who has, apparently, been woken up by the bangings of costumers. She had rings on her fists, to boot. And her hair was a flying mess, so maybe that would blind her? Either way, Shintaro was planning how to get out of there alive, and maybe snag some books and information. Oh, and, of course, the woman.

Maybe.

It's a world of the smartest, most cowardly. She was an adult, she could deal with it.

"I can tell you're tired," the woman practically hummed. She offered a sympathetic smile that paused the librarian mid-spit-fire and closed her mouth. "And I'm so sorry we had to bother you like this."_We?! Lady, keep me out of this! What sort of partner confidetailty is this?_

"But, you see," she continued on, "this library is very important, and it has one of the best services and book collections. We were worried about it - about you, since this is also your job - and so, here we are."

Pausing, she added, for good measure, "we're sorry to bother you," and gave him a pointed look from the corner of her eye.

_'We're in this together'_, her eyes said, _'one for all, all for one'._

_'Well, someone's gotta survive and procreate the new generation of readers,'_ he imagined his eyes said,_ 'go for it, Eve, your sacrifice will be remembered.'_

The librarian didn't look very much convinced, nor agreeable - which was a bad sign - but she grudgingly tied her hair with one hand and muttered, "Some stupid teenagers set a fire to most of the books. I've stayed the night, along with some other employees' he saw a man peek his head from around a stack of burnt books he'd only just noticed - he thought they were some sort of modern art or something -, "and we're going to be closed for a long time."

How'd she know it was a group of 'stupid teenagers''? On behalf of the teenage part of the child population, he felt he had the right to internally suspect that the real culprit were some of those people who stayed in the very back of the supposedly 'haunted', boring classics section of the library, smoking, or the ones in the bathroom who sat their bums on the toilet seat and didn't get out for forty five minutes. If it wasn't drugs, it was cigarettes, and that is the rule of 'when you have to wait outside a bathroom stall quietly for forty five minutes while the person inside isn't aware of your presence as he coughs like the amateur he is every five minutes and goes nervously silent before flushing the toilet.'

"How long?" the red-eyed lady said.

"The entire summer."

"Oh." The woman said.

Oh. Oh, fucking, oh. He couldn't waste his only vacation on jobs and no internet. He didn't have enough money for the internet café visits to increase over thrice a month. He just didn't.

Fucking unfair.

He went silent as he tried to make himself get over it and accept it. It would be easy to just forget about books. And his worries. Like he always did. It always worked.

Until, of course, he heard someone say something along the lines of, "want to...come with...?"

"Huh?" He glanced up at the woman. The library's door was closed. Apparently he'd missed the climax.

"I have cookies." The woman smiled again.

OH MY GOD! PEDO!

He must have showed some of his panic on his face, or his eyes, because the woman frowned and repeated. "I own the bookstore, and I can let you read some until you've decided if you wanted to buy one," she paused, "or, how about as a small depressed party, you could read any book for free today? I have cookies, too, and pineapple gum if you want to clean your teeth. Oh, there's a bathroom too!"

What a nice pedo. And a really smart one. Granted, she could be an actual bookstore owner, since she actually visited the library, but still...

Pedos had occupations, didn't they? And they had hobbies, too. They didn't waste all their times abducting kids, but maybe she just felt super depressed and decided to abduct him and...

-how horrifying Shintaro can't even-

"Um," she said nervously, "my name's Kozakura Shion, and of course you should inform your 'kaa-san first, but..."

He glanced up at her again. Honest, anxious face. A crease between her eyebrows, a nervous smile playing on her lips, and that heavenly cookie smile...

Call his mother? Good luck with that.

He shoved a hands in his pocket. Staring at her dead in the eye, he said, "Kisaragi Shintaro, are you a pedo?"

**. . . * . . .**

**A/N:**

_This could qualify as an actual chapter!_

_Review, and tell me about your fave ships, please (with Shin in it, preferably). I hope this hurried little thing was okay. I got homework and stuff, so bye._

_Check out my other Kagepro stories._

_Sincerely,_

_Moi. :)_


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